reuters.com.“French prosecutor urges extradition of Kazakh tycoon” - A French public prosecutor recommended on Thursday that Kazakh oligarch Mukhtar Ablyazov, accused of embezzling up to $6 billion from his former bank, be extradited to Ukraine, which along with Russia is seeking to put him on trial.

worldbulletin.net.“Ukraine holds key to Putin's dream of Eurasian Union” - Putin sees his "Eurasian Union", in which Ukraine would play a central role, as a future rival to China, the United States and the European Union. Ukraine's refusal to sign a trade pact drawing it into Europe's orbit marked a victory for Vladimir Putin, winning him time to lure Kiev into a project for a trade and political bloc stretching from the frontiers of China to the edge of the EU.

themonthly.com.au.“Kazakhstan’s city of gold” - If you want to know the weather in Kazakhstan, don’t bother checking the international report on SBS – Central Asia is virtually the one place on the globe it doesn’t cover, as if that big space between Russia, China, Mongolia, Uzbekistan and the Caspian Sea were just an empty hole.

eurasiareview.com. “The Dragon Looks West: China And Central Asia – Analysis” - In September Chinese President Xi Jinping visited four Central Asian countries: Turkmenistan, Uzbekistan, Kazakhstan and Kyrgyzstan. During the visit, he signed billions of dollars worth of deals with the energy rich Central Asian countries.

xinhua.com.“DPRK's Jang Song-Thaek executed” - Jang Song-Thaek, deposed senior official of the Democratic People's Republic of Korea (DPRK), has been executed after the Special Military Tribunal found him guilty of treason, the official news agency KCNA reported on Friday.

reuters.com.“Insight: Far from idyll, rural France feels left in the past” - The first thing a visitor to this rural French village sees upon entering town are road signs pointing the way out.The sprawling parking lot that is Sousceyrac's main square is mostly empty on a weekday afternoon. The tourist information office, post office and bull semen cooperative are closed, and the rumble of hay and lumber trucks passing through town without stopping adds to the air of isolation.